Tuesday, December 31, 2013

You may recall that the author of The Lair of the Twelve Princesses (Face-Lift 1153) sought our help in creating copy to accompany an e-pub version of her previously published tale. It's now up at Amazon.com. The author writes: I finally got this up. Thanks to everybody for your work on the description and contents!

Monday, December 30, 2013

Fourteen-year-old Cordenqua becomes an orphan when he accidentally kills his father during battle. [Suddenly the one flaw in the decision to battle at night becomes clear.] Consumed with grief and guilt, he declines the sacred ceremony of manhood, earning the condemnation of the villagers.

Shamed, hated, and alone, Cordenqua runs to Eloq’s Temple, aware the God will strike with lightning any but the Called who enter. Killer of Father, traitor of faith and tribesman, he leaps through the archway.

Nothing happens.

Certain he has been Called, Cordenqua intends to tell the Elkek, the village Holy Man, of his Calling. However, as he remembers the Elkek’s insistence that only a Holy Man can be Called, he decides to keep his Calling secret. [I note that the Elkek hasn't leapt through the archway.]

Though the tribesman hate Cordenqua, the Elkek shows compassion and adopts him as his son, filling the void that his father’s death left. Cordenqua becomes bonded to a new companion and adopted brother—the Elkek’s son Rhatanqua.
Cordenqua attempts to convince Rhatanqua he is Called by leaping into the temple unharmed. While trying to stop him, Rhatanqua trips through the archway. Eloq strikes with deadly lightning, killing Cordenqua’s adopted brother.

Cordenqua drags his lifeless companion’s body back to the village—the second death he has caused. Consumed with anger, the Elkek attempt [attempts] to kill him, and Cordenqua flees the village, having lost all those he’s ever loved.

Before he leaves, Cordenqua takes the Holy Writ, the sacred text of his religion and discovers a hidden prophecy that suggests that Cordenqua will save his people by destroying their false religion. Cordenqua refuses to accept the prophecy, choosing instead to believe that his Father’s spirit flies among eagles.

After finding shelter in a cave, he discovers a glowing box (computer monitor) that spies on both his tribe and the enemy’s. Seeing the glowing box, he recalls the words of the prophecy that foretells such an encounter, yet still he rejects its validity. [It was foretold that I would encounter an impossible glowing box that spies on my tribe, and so I have, but it could have been just a lucky guess.]

Upon the mountain’s top, overlooking the land below, he sees the enemy tribe preparing to attack his village. Though they hated him, he warns the villagers. He plunges into battle, hoping for death. [If you're really hoping for death, I recommend plunging into battle without your sword and shield.] Before the fight ends, the dead bodies of his enemies litter the ground and the village welcomes him back, naming him the village hero.

He finds the warmth of acceptance addicting and rejects his destiny, ignores the prophecy, and lives among his people. However, the Elkek maintains his hatred for Cordenqua, and his hatred intensifies when Cordenqua falls in love with his niece, Ariane. After a long battle with his hormones, he rejects her, hoping his abstinence will win back the love and acceptance of the Elkek. [If you want to win a guy's love and acceptance, rejecting his beloved niece is a good start.]

Ariane marries another, and Cordenqua chooses again to live in isolation, too heartbroken to be near her. In a fit of jealousy, her husband attempts to kill her, but Cordenqua kills him instead, leaving Ariane widowed with a child. [He's in isolation, too heartbroken to be near her, but he happens to be on the scene when her husband tries to kill her?] [Also, that kid appeared awfully fast. Maybe sticking "Nine months later" in there somewhere would help.]

Having saved the life of his niece, the Elkek finally forgives Cordenqua and consents to their marriage. [This says that the Elkek saved his niece, which isn't what you mean. (Whether it also says that the Elkek is going to marry Cordenqua depends on the times they live in.) If you want to say this in one sentence: Having saved Ariane's life, Cordenqua is forgiven by the Elkek, who even helps plan the Cordenqua/Ariane wedding.]

Cordenqua speaks to Ariane of his secret doubts and she makes connections he had missed, proving the religion is fabricated [The line "Once we convince them to worship us, they'll do any ridiculous thing we want" was the giveaway.] and the rituals of their faith serve no other purpose than to keep them in perpetual war with their enemy. [It's perpetual only if no one ever wins. Is there some reason neither side can win the war?]

His father’s death was meaningless, as were the deaths of many others. [His father's death was meaningless whether the religion is legit or not, as it was an accident.]

Enraged, he runs to the temple, intending to kill the enemy that hides within its walls, but not before the village learns of his intentions. Half the villagers, led by the Elkek, hunt him, [This Elkek flip-flops more often than a politician.] while the other half attempt to save the village hero.

Before any can stop him, he leaps through the archway. When they see he’s unharmed, some hail him as a god, while others seethe with hatred. As he prepares to enter the temple’s doors, the neighboring tribe crest a hill adorned with battle armor. [I suppose we can infer it's not the hill that's adorned with battle armor, but if the neighboring tribe, adorned with battle armor, crest a nearby hill, you'll escape the grammar nitpickers.]

He fights desperately to protect his wife and adopted child, but an enemy breaks their line of defense and stabs her [the wife or the child?] in the back. [He's fighting desperately to protect his wife and child, yet the single enemy soldier who breaks the line of defense manages to get within stabbing distance?] Dying, she commands [Implores?] Cordenqua to take care of her child. He circumvents the deadly barriers to the temple and enters, convinced that their enemy has magical powers that can heal Ariane. When he enters, he finds dozens of corpses and a message on their computer monitors—Project Eloq—Training and Selecting the Nation’s Warriors. Program Terminated. [Is this a novel or a Twilight Zone episode? The Holy Writ is . . . a cookbook!!!]

Ariane dies, [What?! You're killing off the only likable character? This is worse than the third Hunger Games book, though I'll probably still watch the movie just because I believe Jennifer Lawrence is my destined soulmate.] leaving him alone with his adopted child.

Notes

Did the tribes have any religion before Project Eloq began? If so, is the Holy Writ the sacred text of the tribe's original religion? If so, is there also a sacred text of the false religion? If not, why have the tribe chosen to follow the new religion?

So are the corpses the people who were monitoring the project? If so, were they killed by the God? If so, why did he wait so long to kill them, allowing all these meaningless deaths?

The techno-superior race secretly monitoring a more primitive civilization is the plot of a dozen Star Treks, but the training-of-warriors aspect may add a different twist. Which nation's warriors are being trained in this project? If it's the techno-superior nation's, I don't buy that they would need great warriors from tribal villages. Unless they're selecting gladiators to fight for their entertainment? Even if that's the plan, you haven't said that the best warriors are suddenly disappearing.

Thursday, December 26, 2013

1. They say anyone who dares enter Eloq's Temple will be struck by lightning. Which explains the low turnout on the sabbath. But one grief-stricken boy decides to end his life by entering the temple, and . . . nothing happens.

2. Kelsey, third-year student at Rugglesbottom Witch School, is fed up. The other girls are snotty, the boys are jerks, and Master Snoftrun just gave her alchemy final a C. When she finds a strange wand in the library, she fools with it until she knows what it does. Fourth year is going to be much, much better.

3. Thor's dorky younger brother Eloq wishes he was as cool as the god of thunder, but all he can manage are a few sparks and a gurgle. Until he finds the incriminating shots of Zeus, that is, who grants him the power to control solar flares. Take that, Thor! But can the god of geeks outrun a gang of fried gods, furious at the blackened remains of their pantheon?

4. There is a reason not to feed beans to Eloqs after midnight. Eloqs are bald, fat, and flatulent, and cowards to boot. Blue fire spews forth from them like stink from a skunk. Only history will show how a small band of humans saved Endor with the help of "Eloq's Lightning".

5. It's 10000 BC and humanity has crawled from the primordial soup. Eloq's band of Neanderthals is doomed unless they can figure out how to stay warm in the frozen wasteland. Hey! What's that sky fire all about?

6. Stocky quarter horse Eloq's Lightning looks nothing like his race-winning parents. The hard-luck colt spends his first three years battling illness and his handlers. Now a three-year-old gelding, will he finally prove to be a real runner--or just another failure on the way to the slaughterhouse?

Original Version

Dear Evil Editor:

Fourteen-year-old Cordenqua becomes an orphan when he accidentally kills his father during battle. [Oops. Sorry, I thought you were an orc.] Consumed with grief and guilt, he declines the tribal ceremony of manhood, earning the condemnation of the villagers. [We give you the honor of going into battle against our enemy to save our village from destruction and to save us from slaughter, and all we ask in return is that you participate in a meaningless ceremony. And you decline? Never show your face here again!]

Shamed, hated, and alone, Cordenqua runs to Eloq’s Temple, aware the God will strike with lightning any who enter. Killer of Father, traitor of faith and tribesman, he leaps through the archway.

Nothing happens. [Out of curiosity, have all others who've entered been struck with lightning, or has no one else ever entered? If the latter, have they tried sending in a goat? Or sentencing a criminal to enter the temple?]

Uncertain why Eloq spared him, he searches the Holy Writ and finds a hidden prophecy buried within its text, foretelling [of] one who will save his people by overthrowing their false religion. [Is this "Holy Writ" their Bible? Because it would be odd to discover a passage, even in one of the more obscure books of the Christian Bible, declaring that Christianity is a lot of hooey.] [Possibly there was one, and back when they were deciding which books to include in the Bible they came upon it and said, "Whoa. This has gotta go. This could put us out of work and we'd have to give up our cushy digs and toil in the sludge business."]

Cordenqua is terrified of losing his own faith, but unable to suppress his curiosity. He unravels [investigates?] the [tribal] traditions and discovers that an unseen enemy with mystic powers [AKA God] created their religion to compel them to war against their neighboring tribe. Cordenqua must either fight his own people and religion and save those who hate him, [Not clear to me what "fighting his own people and religion" entails. When a hated fourteen-year-old kid declares himself the prophet destined to overthrow his haters' religion, his haters might be inclined to provide him a different destiny.] or submit to tradition while those he loves die in meaningless battles. ["Those he loves" meaning those who hate him, right?]

ELOQ’S LIGHTNING, complete at 50,000 words, is a YA novel that blends science fiction and fantasy. Set in a culture similar to tribal Native America, it incorporates a fantasy-like setting with plot twists reminiscent of The Maze Runner and I have queried you specifically because you represented this book.

Below I have included a synopsis. Thank you for your consideration.

Notes

Not bad, though one or more of the issues I've brought up may be worthy of consideration in the query.

Creating a religion that requires a tribe to war with another tribe is a good strategy if you're in a third tribe. But I don't see why you need to have mystic powers to do this. If you have mystic powers you can either convince the tribes you're a god and order them to war, or use your powers to wipe them out yourself. Creating a whole religion seems like a lot of trouble if you want people to wipe each other out rather than worship you.

You might want to make Corky older than 14. He'll be more useful in battle when he's bigger and stronger and smart enough to tell the difference between his enemy and his own father. Plus YA readers prefer to read about kids older than themselves.

Wednesday, December 25, 2013

Tuesday, December 24, 2013

There are dozens of books with The Night Before Christmas in their titles. For instance, you can fill in the blank in The _______ Night Before Christmas with any of the following words, and that's an actual book:

Below I've listed 34 ways the blank could be filled in. Seventeen are actual books according to Barnes & Noble's web site. The other seventeen could exist, but as far as I know they're fakes submitted by the Evil Minions.

Friday, December 20, 2013

1. GV Black knew his world was coming to an end. The wunderkind of the dental superheroes was aging and ill. A disease was upon him and eventually it would turn him to worm food. If only he could remember the name of the cure; the unspoken, dental "F" word. If he doesn't invoke the cure he will die and his legacy shall always contain . . . A Crimson Stain.

2. Nothing hurts business at a brothel like a crimson stain on the sheets, especially when it's the result of one of the girls having her throat ripped out and her body left in pieces. Now it's up to Wayward Russell to figure out if the place is haunted, and if so, by what.

3. Vivacious duchesse Louise la Fontaine is mad for the gallant dandy Louis la Vaux. But he's the bastard son of the prince, and the King has forbidden him to marry. Can she use her wiles to convince the King to change his mind?

4. When meek housewife Holly finds a stain on the collar of her husband's
dress shirt, she immediately recognizes the crimson lipstick of the
bimbo next door. Drama, tears, and midlife soul-searching ensue.

5. When DJ Shazam enters his apartment he learns two things. First, he should have stayed in Aruba. Second, the body in his bathtub is going to leave...A Crimson Stain.

6. Crimson McStainian is a professional pimple-popper, leaving calling
cards on the faces of bathroom mirrors. Business is booming until Acne
McFacecleaner moves into town. His own self-worth threatened, Crimson
must either find new meaning in life, or stain the streets with crimson
from more than just bad acne.

Original Version

Dear Evil Editor,

London, 1860. Wayward Russell has spent his entire life running from monsters. Ghosts, demons, werebeasts—he knows about all of them, the creatures hiding in the shadows and watching for their next victim. Every night he draws protective wards around his room, every day he moves on to a new place, [Every day? Moving is a pain if you do it every few years, and a guy who moves every day has long since run out of friends he can ask to help him move.] [If protective wards work, why does he have to move?] constantly looking over his shoulder to try and escape the horrors he knows are there. [If you're trying to set a scene in which monsters exist, you're overdoing it. I'm starting to think the monsters aren't there and Wayward is nuts.]

Then one night he meets Jenny, a young prostitute at Madam’s Cat knocking shop. [Is that where you take your cat to get it knocked up?] There is something haunting Madam Cat’s, and Jenny wants Wayward’s help in getting rid of it. But Wayward has made a career out of never sticking his neck out for anyone, [So why does Jenny go to him for help?] so he sends Jenny away with a bagged exorcism and instructions not to bother him again. Wayward thinks that’s the end of it—until a week later, he’s dragged into Madam Cat’s and told that Jenny’s dead, [What? Jenny was the only character I liked.] her throat ripped out and her body left in pieces. The fiery Madam Cat demands that Wayward fix the mess he’s created, and, shaken by Jenny’s violent death, Wayward reluctantly agrees. [Have you considered having Madam Cat's throat get ripped out and Jenny, who of course has a heart of gold, seeking Wayward's help?]

But his investigation reveals something far more dangerous than the simple haunting he expected. There’s something else in the brothel, something that creaks the floorboards in empty rooms and makes lamps explode, something that tears the girls’ clothes in the night and leaves bloody claw marks on the walls. [Lemme get this straight. Jenny has her throat ripped out and her body left in pieces, but it's only when Wayward hears creaking floorboards and sees torn clothing that he realizes this is far more dangerous than a simple haunting? This list is stuff I would expect if it is a simple haunting.] Something old and wild and vicious that greatly resents being interfered with. Creatures like this are exactly why Wayward never gets involved, but this time he has no choice—Madam Cat won’t let him leave until her house is safe, and she has enough thugs to make his life very unpleasant if things don’t work out to her satisfaction. And Jenny’s ghost has returned, terrorising Wayward every night and insisting he save the other girls from what killed her. [Does she tell him what that was?]

For once in his life, Wayward may end up doing the right thing, but will it cost him the very safety and anonymity he has worked so hard to protect?

A CRIMSON STAIN is historical fantasy of 60,000 words. Thank you for your time and consideration.

Notes

The protective wards and bagged
exorcism hint that Wayward has useful knowledge, but you haven't
convinced me he's any more qualified to handle this than the thugs are.
If he hails from a family of ghostbusters you might mention that when
you introduce him. Introducing him as someone who's been living in fear
of monsters his whole life leaves us wondering why anyone consults him in such matters. Who is he?

The list of things that prove this isn't a simple haunting needs to be shorter and scarier.

This is mostly setup. One paragraph setting up the situation (Lily-livered Wayward Russell has been charged with investigating strange goings-on and murder in Madam Cat's brothel) would leave more space to tell us what his plan is and what goes wrong when he puts it into action.

Wednesday, December 18, 2013

1. Captain Henry has horrible business sense. His first two shops closed in
the red. Who knew an underwater pet store that didn't sell fish or a
restaurant that served raw brains wouldn't fly? Henry borrowed money
from the mafia to finance his next gig. He knows he has nailed it this
time. Wing-walker's headwear today, and cement galoshes tomorrow.

2. Captain Henry is looking for an angle to make his haberdashery successful. Realizing that nomadic tribesmen don't have ready access to fine men's clothing, he rigs his shop for flight. Hey, if Mohammad won't come to the haberdashery . . .

3. When dashing Captain Henry visits the small rural hamlet, the folk are
captivated by his urbane wit and charm, and tales of his wondrous
Haberdashery. They don't associate him with the spate of mysterious
disappearances. Like everybody else, they're just in awe of the
amazingly soft leather jackets he tailors for the creme of Society.

4. Hank buys a secondhand hat store. The inventory comes from the deceased
left at the county morgue. The store curses the hats--when a buyer dons a
hat, the dead person’s spirit takes control of the wearer’s mind and completes the deceased’s unfinished business.

5. When orphan Divel is sold to Captain Henry for a silver coin, he expects
to at last have a chance at decent clothes and a good place to live.
But the flamboyant Captain isn't a tailor; he's a pimp, with the most
demanding clientele in all of Outer Gabloosh. Now Divel just has to find
a supply of fresh, cross-dressing gnomes. He's gonna earn those
clothes.

Original Version

Dear Evil Editor and co.,

Prince Leo is engaged to be married. His fiancee is Princess Isabeau, a
beautiful young woman with an alarming fondness for pointy objects.
Their marriage will mean peace and prosperity for their two kingdoms.
There's just one problem with the arrangement: Leo doesn't love his
bride-to-be. [Actually, that makes two problems, the first being the ice pick she keep under her pillow.]

Desperate, Leo flees the palace, disguises himself as a commoner, and
finds work aboard Captain Henry's High-Flying Haberdashery. As part of
the airborne shop's crew, Leo flies from one town to another, buying,
selling, and seeing the world beyond the palace walls for the first time
in his life. Along the way he befriends not only his crew mates but
also the nomadic tribes of rovers who wander the kingdom. [No need to call them both "nomadic" and "rovers."] [Also, if the shop flies from town to town, when do they have time to befriend these roving tribes? In fact, has it occurred to Captain Henry that these tribes are nomadic because they're trying to escape the haberdashery that keeps landing in their midst trying to sell them fezzes? I can see landing your haberdashery near a nomadic tribe once, figuring they would find it convenient not to have to go into town to buy pants. But when they see you flying in a week later they're thinking, WTF? We bought these pants just to get rid of these assholes and they're back already? It's like this charity that was phoning me every day so I finally thought, Maybe if I give them money they'll give me some peace. So I sent them a check and they started phoning twice as often. Luckily I have caller ID. My point being, Leo doesn't have time to befriend the tribesmen unless the haberdashers drop in on them so often they develop a seething hatred of all haberdashers.]

The rovers are valuable business partners [How so?] and invaluable friends to the
crew, [Wait, didn't I just quash that argument?] so when their encampments are destroyed in a series of suspicious
fires, the haberdashers vow to find and stop the arsonist. [I've bought into detectives who were blind, deaf, missing limbs, paralyzed, and even Belgian. But haberdasher detectives? Come on, man!] It soon
becomes clear that keeping their promise will force the haberdashers to
risk their own lives- unless Leo is willing to sacrifice his new-found
freedom to pull some royal strings.

Meanwhile, Leo's fiancee is hunting him, determined to marry him and gain control of his kingdom by any means necessary.

CAPTAIN HENRY'S HIGH-FLYING HABERDASHERY is a 73,000-word YA fantasy
novel. [There's been no hint that this was YA. You should mention Leo's age when introducing him.] My fiction and poetry have appeared in local publications, most
recently in the young adult-oriented newspaper Teen Ink.

Included in this submission are things that I would include but am not
going to right now because reasons. Thank you for your time and
consideration!

Sincerely,

Notes

How old is Isabeau? Her determination to gain control of Leo's kingdom by any means necessary suggests she's older than I would expect for a key character in YA. Why is this YA? The flying shop suggests steampunk.

A series about crime-solving haberdashers would be cool. And I would expect it to be funny. And based on the title and the amount of time devoted to the haberdashery, maybe that's what we have. But based on how the query opens and closes, the Leo/Isabeau story is the main plot, and not so funny. If Leo is the main character, we need to focus on him; all he does is join the crew of a flying haberdashery. Is he active in solving the crimes or does he merely pull some royal strings, thereby allowing others to solve the crimes? Does Leo want to continue being a flying haberdasher because he has friends and freedom and is pretty good at selling pants, or is he just trying to avoid marrying Isabeau? If the latter, he's just stalling. What's his ultimate plan to accomplish his ultimate goal?

I realize the book is already written, but if it doesn't fly, consider dumping Leo and Isabeau and writing about Captain Henry's High-Flying Haberdashery and Detective Agency. They're not only great detectives, they're always dressed impeccably. You can fill lots of space describing fabrics and wardrobes the way the Nero Wolfe books talk about food and the John Rain books talk about single malt whiskies.

Tuesday, December 17, 2013

1. No Grandma! You can't make a Christmas tree out of fake cobwebs from Halloween! But Grandma did, and strung it with lights, and Jake and Alyssa loved their grandma's cobweb tree until it started eating stuff. Now it's trying to eat them.

2. The sun shines bright
And the winds blow free
And Charlotte nests safe
In The Cobweb Tree

Then the sky turns dark
And the air sooty
Tiny Charlotte coughs
In The Cobweb Tree

Poor Charlotte takes wing
Flies to new safety
And at night she cries
For her Cobweb Tree.

3. Wanda is the coven's newest Wiccan candidate. To prove her mettle she must raise awareness and funds. She tried a bake sale and a warlock walk to no avail. The town's founding father's have taken notice and built bonfires at Wanda's newest idea. Hilarity and death ensue when Wanda starts her own "gifts to the poor" Cobweb Tree.

4. Katie is thrilled when Finn asks her out, but not so thrilled when he abandons her deep in the forest where the first person she meets tries to put her to work for his credit agency. She escapes, but can she also escape the mysterious and unmentionable . . . cobweb tree?Original Version

Dear Evil Editor (may your shark's grin never blunt)

Sixteen[-]year-old Katie Harrison has had only one thing on her mind for the past two weeks: new boy Finn O’Malley. The most exciting thing ever to happen in her chocolate-fuelled, [fueled] bookworm life, he’s mysterious as a cat—tall and dark and utterly gorgeous. Katie is sure he’s interested in her, and when he asks her to meet his family, it seems that all her fantasies are coming true. What she didn’t expect was for Finn to tell her that he and his family are actually sidhe—wild, magical beings from an other [another] world. [Is it really necessary to tell us she didn't expect this? No one would expect this. And if it happened, who would believe it? Reminds me of the time when Get Smart and The Man from Uncle were popular shows and I phoned one of my classmates I had a crush on and told her I was a spy and needed her help on my next mission. She not only didn't buy it and agree to help me save the world, she also gave me a wide berth for the rest of my college career.] And none of her fantasies included Finn abandoning her in the never-ending sidhe forests to save his own skin.

The sidhe otherworld is treacherous and secretive, full of unwritten rules and protocol that Katie has no idea how to handle. Just introducing herself is dangerous, as she discovers when she accidentally binds herself into the thrall of the druid Cahal. Katie can’t believe that Finn would desert her like this, [Already said; see last sentence of previous paragraph.] but[and] in the end, only blind chance saves her from a lifetime of slavery. With no sign of Finn and no food, no toilet paper or hand sanitizer, just rain and trees and creatures that howl in the night, Katie is desperate to get home. Too scared to trust anyone after Cahal, the only thing she can think to do is to try and get to the edge of the forest. So she starts walking.

But the forest is full of dangers, and a growing number of creatures are curious about Katie’s involvement with Cahal, who, she discovers, was far more than just an ordinary druid. [Considering how little is known about the druids by us, not to mention Katie, how can she tell if a druid is ordinary or not? It's like a spaceship from another galaxy lands on Earth, and when the first being exits we immediately declare it no ordinary space alien.] Her connection with him puts her at the heart of a massive network of curses, promises, debts and secrets; and all of the people involved are now looking to Katie to write off their debts, fulfil their favours and tally up their credit. [Cahal is no ordinary druid; he manages a payday loan agency.] Katie’s never so much as killed a spider before, but in the forest, weakness is something to be exploited and ignorance is no excuse. No one believes her protests of ignorance; bluffing her way through the business transactions complicates everything; being kind only creates more problems, and things start getting bloody very quickly. With werewolves, ghosts and sidhe hunters on her trail, and the threat of dysentery, mortal injury and starvation, Katie's going to have to learn fast if she wants to live to see tomorrow, never mind get home in one piece.

THE COBWEB TREE is a YA fantasy novel of 75,000 words. Thank you for your time and consideration.

Notes

Finn has too big a role in the query. He's here only to explain how Katie ends up in the forest.

Bad enough that Katie Harrison's secret crush turned out to be sidhe; now he's abandoned her in the treacherous sidhe forests to save his own skin. Seeking a way out, she meets Cahal, the sidhe equivalent of VISA, who wants to enslave her as his collections officer. Katie escapes, but now everyone in the forest is after her to write off their debts, and if she can't bluff her way through a few business transactions, she may not live to see tomorrow, much less her home and family.

That's your setup, and it leaves plenty of room to tell us what happens. What's Katie's plan? What goes wrong? What's her new plan? Does she have an ally? Make sure you're telling a cohesive story, not just listing a few random things that happen. One thing leads to another. Cause and effect.

Tuesday, December 10, 2013

1. Benny's boss asks him to send a shipment of "product" to Santa Fe, NM. Unfortunately, the dyslexic Benny sends it to Santa Fe, MN. Now Benny's on the run from the feds, rival mobs, and his own crew. Will he make it to Minnesota, or will he perish...On the Way to Santa Fe?

2. Free-wheelin', beer-lovin', good-lookin' Joe Ditman makes ends meet with
odd jobs in Milwaukee. When he inherits the multi-million dollar estate
of his long-lost uncle, he heads south to collect. But On the Way to
Santa Fe, he meets a sexy angel who changes his heart.

3. Lights in the New Mexico sky can only mean one thing... Sadly, nothing
to do with hallucinogens this time. On the way to the state's capital, Cory and Rob are captured by aliens who promptly return them after
appropriating all their recreational substances. But time dilation means
1969 is long gone and our boys are out of date. And worse still, their
supplier is nowhere to be found.

4. When blood is found in Daniel Bristol's trailer outside
Denver he becomes a suspect in the disappearance of a local girl. To
stay one step ahead of the law he heads for Santa Fe, New Mexico, 400 miles away. Kind of a road trip designed to make him look guilty as hell. Also, a wily coyote.

5. A scrappy group of Dionne Warwick impersonators prepare for the biggest
talent showcase of the year. Hilarity ensues when they entrust their
travel arrangements to dim-witted Candida Splendida, and their simple
trip becomes a wild adventure of hitching rides with drunk clowns and
tap-dancing nuns.

6. Mallory's dog ran away, her fiancé left her for her younger sister, and she just lost her job. Trading her last $78 for a one way bus ticket, Mal finds the last thing she was looking for...On the Way to Santa Fe.

Original Version

Dear Evil Editor,

Two quarreling brothers, one missing girl, [one missing verb,] and a family secret that could kill all three. I believe my psychological suspense manuscript ON THE WAY TO SANTA FE (72,000 words) will interest you [Maybe, but I'm not going to Santa Fe to read it.] as it balances the fast-paced plotting of a thriller with the introspection of a literary mystery. [Is a literary mystery something like Who really wrote Shakespeare's plays? Or is it a murder mystery by someone who writes better than all those hack mystery writers who somehow keep getting published?][I realize thrillers, mysteries, and psychological suspense will probably all be shelved in the same section, but I prefer that you name one genre (say, thriller) and then show that there's psychological suspense and a mystery in your plot description.] [Also, the fact that your title rhymes has started that San Jose song running through my head, which is not something you want to be responsible for. What's wrong with Albuquerque?]

Daniel Bristol is twenty-two, shy, and likes nothing better than sketching the mountains behind his trailer in Golden, Colorado. [That's because mountains are among the easiest things to sketch:]

He dislikes nothing more than his antagonizing brother. To say Dolan makes life difficult for Daniel is as much an understatement as saying a jackrabbit is prey to a coyote. [Calling "a jackrabbit is prey to a coyote" an understatement is an overstatement. I'd call it a fact.] [On the other hand, thinking, Evil Editor will be miffed by my use of an animal analogy to help him understand what I mean by the word 'understatement'" is an understatement.] [Also, the analogy should be roadrunner is prey to a coyote.]

When Dolan claims responsibility for the disappearance of a local girl, Daniel assumes it's another cruel prank, but changes his opinion after finding blood in the trailer and a detective at his doorstep. Daniel wants to cooperate with the police, but he can't. He knows his brother. [That statement does not clear up what you meant by he can't cooperate with the police.] The only way out [Out of what? Is Daniel a suspect? If Dolan claimed responsibility, why isn't Dolan the one being grilled?] is to stay one step ahead of the Law, unravel Dolan's motive, and find the young woman before it's too late.

Unbeknownst to him, Dolan harbors a dark secret that will drag them deep into the mountains of New Mexico. [Are they on foot? Golden is hundreds of miles from Santa Fe.] Facing the unspoken truth will require an unending reservoir of courage - something Daniel lacks. [Either it doesn't require unending courage, or Daniel doesn't lack unending courage, or someone else (someone with unending courage) should be the main character.] Failure will damn the girl's fate and leave him broken . . . wondering what happened ON THE WAY TO SANTA FE.

I appreciate your consideration and look forward to being ridiculed in public.

Sincerely,

Notes

This becomes progressively more vague. Phrases like "harbors a dark secret," "the unspoken
truth," and "damn the girl's fate" may sound good on the back cover when you're trying to entice someone to buy the book, but agents and editors aren't going to read your manuscript to find out what you're talking about. They want to know who's the main character and what's his situation. Then what's his goal and how does he plan to achieve it? Then what goes wrong, and what will happen if he can't overcome it? Be specific. Make it sound thrilling and suspenseful, but don't let on that there's anything literary about it.

Wednesday, December 04, 2013

Displayed in this prison Jeffrey
calls a "proper dress", I fight a losing battle for dignity. He only
trumpets our betrothal because he's convinced tolerance of a suspected
exotic proves his standing. Lord Whithall revels in boasting the spoils
his favor won in the East at every opportunity.

The
moneylenders and I know better, but Jeffrey's grasping friends are happy
to oblige his illusion. Slaves parade onto the lawn, laden with trays.
The men shovel food into their sweaty faces as if it might otherwise
disappear. I witnessed finer manners dining with Temüjin's hordes.

Bannantine wags a thick finger. "Better save your gold, boy-o. You're too old to play the gallant for Charles."

What of Charles? I'd ask if anyone would answer.

"More of this madness." Weakness tightens Jeffrey's voice. "Lambert will never allow his return."

Why must news travel slower than gossip?

If
Charles rules, I can cast off the bonds of this farce. I won't need a
ship. I'll fly to my northern lands. Until then, I can keep mum, forfeit
what little fortune Jeffrey knows about, and endure.

The King will surely remember our adventures. Nine years isn't long, even for a blood-born man.

The theater lights came up in the private screening room.

"Jesus
H. Chrysler, Priscilla," said Elvis. "No one's going to watch this crap,
and the few who do will know it's about me and the Colonel. I don't
care if you've picked an obscure moment in English history and changed
everyone's names, I'm pulling the funding. I won't have
the world remembering the Colonel and me as some flag waving rainbow
coalition."

That evening, Elvis Presley was found
dead in the toilet outside of the Jungle Room. Opening: Mich Fisher.....Continuation: Kregger

Monday, December 02, 2013

Guess the PlotCaptured by the Pirate 1. When Henri the pirate captures Kadi and puts the moves on her, she wonders if she should tell him that she's the queen of the vampires? He's pretty handsome, and something like that can be a stumbling block to a relationship.

2. Johnny Depp is on the run for a crime he didn't commit. When Hollywood hopeful, Stacy Sterling, stumbles onto his hiding place will she be . . . Captured by the Pirate?

3. Marcy jokes often, as she drinks from her rum-filled flask, that she has a little well-endowed pirate inside her. When he crawls out of her one night and whisks her away to his big ship, Marcy knows she's found her prince. Her friends will never believe her adventure!4. Starlet Ruby McMahon is believed lost at sea, but a garbled voicemail brings her cold case to light. DJ Shazam is on the trail, if only he can get past Ruby's boytoy Ex. Also, a heroic dolphin trainer. 5. Feisty, fiery Annabelle takes over her father's merchant ship when he drinks himself to death. Using her cunning, sharp swordsmanship, and bouncing breasts, she quickly becomes the greatest pirate in the bay. When she takes a handsome young man prisoner, she must decide--feed him to her pet sharks, or see if he can survive her own 'feeding frenzy' while tied to the mast?6. Impulsive, tempestuous Lady Ramona Bledsoe has vowed she will never give her heart to any man. Fiercely independent, with fiery-red hair and a will of iron, she bows to no one. Somehow, she's captured by a pirate and then she rips off her bodice. Erotica ensues.7. With his magic markers, Ben draws a pirate who subsequently comes to life and takes Ben on his marvelous adventures at sea. But getting lost in a vast ocean and being forced to drink his own urine gets stale real quick for young Ben.Original VersionDear Deliciously Evil Editor,
Kadi, Queen of Fair vampire bloodlines, has embodied a pantheon of goddesses over her five thousand years. Though her days as the hidden world's greatest supernatural grifter have passed, she struggles to free herself from the stranglehold of the bards' myths. But, with the gathering of clans approaching, she forsakes the dream of life on her own terms until she can recover her sacred Aberdeenshire lands and defend her people from Raven lines' domination. [To someone who hasn't read your book, the following phrases are either open to multiple interpretations or make no sense at all: Queen of Fair vampire bloodlines; embodied a pantheon of goddesses; world's greatest supernatural grifter; the stranglehold of the bards' myths; Raven lines' domination. A simple opening such as After 5000 years, Kadi, a vampire queen, longs to settle down on her sacred Aberdeenshire lands. But first she must recover those lands from a flock of Ravens who've built their nests there. ...is more likely to lure us into the second paragraph.]Then, the restoration of Charles II renders Kadi's planned marriage of convenience to a Cromwell favorite inconvenient. Moneylender Seamus MacGregor calls her betrothed's markers, so she visits Port Royal's most mysterious bachelor to renegotiate. [Not clear whether Port Royal's most mysterious bachelor is her betrothed or the person who originally negotiated her betrothal.] Instead of the rumored pirate, she finds an ancient Raven eager to win her favor. [But it's hard to even have a conversation with someone who never says anything except "Nevermore."] [Am I assumed to know what a Raven is?] Despite his unnerving collection of her past, [Knowledge of her past? Collection of mementos from her past?] including the labyrinth of her secret catastrophe at Knossos, [He has a labyrinth that used to be in Knossos?] Kadi's charmed by Seamus'[s] courtship. [Wait, Seamus the moneylender is courting her? So he's the mysterious bachelor? And her betrothed is . . . the un-mysterious bachelor?] So, when he offers her land, passage to England, and a god in her bed, she leaps at the chance for freedom. [The land and passage are just icing on the cake. The god in her bed was enough to clinch the deal.]While Kadi revels, the real pirate [As opposed to the rumored pirate. It wasn't clear that there was a real pirate; it sounded like everyone thought someone was a pirate, but when Kadi met him he turned out to be a decent guy.] schemes. Henri Abelard, protégé of her estranged sire,suffers the labyrinth's thousand cuts to challenge her in combat. [Why?] Then, he attacks Seamus'[s] ship, taking her hostage. ["Her" meaning the ship or Kadi? What happened with the combat challenge? Did they fight? If so, where, and who won?] She resists Henri's advances, but discovers a true soul mate as he reveals his tragic past, and fights at his side against a bewitched crew. When his life is threatened, [By whom?] Kadi must decide whether to trust her heart and risk the fate of her people and eternal soul to save the man who loves the woman over the goddess. [How does saving Henri put her people at any more risk? Whaddaya mean, "loves the woman over the goddess"? Is Kadi the woman and the goddess?]CAPTURED BY THE PIRATE is a complete 50K-word stand-alone historical paranormal romance novella and the first book of Blood Gods, a retelling of the hero's journey from a female perspective.Thank you for your consideration.Best regards,

Notes

If this is a romance, and Henri is the love interest, more of the query needs to be focused on Henri. One paragraph of setup is plenty. That'll leave you more space to tell us about the Henri/Kadi relationship. I can do without Ravens and labyrinths and Oliver Cromwell.

Not clear who Kadi's people are. People living on her sacred Aberdeenshire lands? People she's turned into her vampire subjects? Both?

Actually, very little is clear. You need to treat the reader as an idiot who knows nothing about anything, not as someone who's read the book and is testing you on whether you've read it.

Tuesday, November 26, 2013

Right
now, as I fight the shakes trying to tear my aching limbs from my body, I
struggle to hold one salient piece of information in my brain: Don’t
swallow. That may not seem extraordinarily difficult, but I haven’t had
a drink in two days. And my mouth is full of liquid. Problem? If I
swallow my season is over. Fucked, before I even step onto the mat. So I
follow the other two sadasses who failed the hydration test yesterday
for my third, and final, inspection.

“Let’s go boys,” the trainer calls. He’s usually gone by six and we’ve pushed it to the limit tonight.

We
hustle forward, well, maybe not quite hustle. Our legs are weak from
running the school’s treadmills halfway to Hell, so it’s more of a
shamble. I catch a glimpse of my ragged reflection in the mirrors as I
enter the trainers’ office. My pointy hips and knees and shoulder blades
break rank from my curving deltoids and rippling abs. I clutch my
suddenly-too-big shorts and step with as much strength as I can summon.

Ahead of me Boyle and Givens take their specimen cups and teeter off to the toilet closet.
Again, I straggle along, cup in hand, fighting the urge to swallow.
Trainers can’t go into the toilet with us, but they don’t let us close
the door, either. Not like wrestlers could really hide a bag of piss in
our clothes like football players do. Wearing the lightest shorts we own
we’re practically naked. Boyle and Givens undoubtedly will be naked in a few seconds.

That's when the angel appears, piercing a shimmering arc of haloes,
Sonic-the-Hedgehoglike, with a parabola of holiness from her piss flaps.

"Rule Number One, semi-naked guys: the word 'swallow' is a red rag to a bull as far as I'm concerned."

Me, Boyle and Givens cry, "WTF, weird avatar!"

"Rule
Number Two," the angel continues, rolling incandescent drool about her
lips with the careworn adeptness of a veteran interior decorator spray
painting a window ledge, "never mention the word 'necklace' in
conjuction with its shorter cousin, 'pearl'."

I turn to Boyle and
Givens. Every pec and ab quivers like a shaved cat morphed into a
scrotum by Loki. "Hey, Mrs Angel. We never said nothin' about no pearl
necklaces."

A cloud of pure benevolence arranges itself over the
angel's filthy smirk. "Rule Number Three is entirely arbitrary, my
personal pet prohibition. It's time you boys learned the difference
between taking and giving, bending over and leaping for joy, Genesis and
Exodus. And while you're at it — SMILE, you chumps! If those shorts
of yours had been a single size smaller, I'd have passed you over for
Barry Manilow mis-tweezering a gray pube from his oiled and
pretzel-imprinted crotch..."

Monday, November 25, 2013

1. Strapped for cash, God comes up with a way to make a fast buck: let people design plants and animals--for a hefty fee. But when the were-T-Rex gets loose, God wonders if He's made His first mistake.

2. He was born in a small village, son of a simple blacksmith. But he's the one who will end centuries of war. Yes it's that story, but completely different because someone pays a price for creating something.

3. Lana gives birth to the world's first talking baby. When the infant describes what life before life is like, he skyrockets to fame as Earth's favorite guru. And when he starts growing horns, Lana realizes his father, a one night stand who claimed to be Satan, wasn't lying.

4. Peek behind the curtains when things go wrong at the God Store, where the deities purchase the tools of their trade, from miracles to something from nothing.

5. When Captain Peril left the Mars Spaceport he didn’t count on finding a stowaway in the form of Dr. Susannah Sagan. Or on being shot at by Icarians, a race of mercenary insectoids. Dr. Sue’s engineered a terra-bomb, and there’s a price on her head big enough for Peril to buy a planetoid of his own and retire. But when he discovers the Icarians want the bomb to terraform Earth for themselves, Peril has to decide if seeing Earth overrun by giant cockroaches makes the price of creation a little too high.

6. Billionaire playboy Rip McCord has never been into the 'Dom scene' and longs for one chaste woman with whom to start a family. If giving up his Friday nights to work at a soup kitchen will help him find the future Mrs. McCord, then that's . . . the Price of Creation.

Original Version

Dear Evil Editor,

Life's greatest lessons cannot be understood through words alone. [Extremely vague, and as no specific example is ever given, not worth saying.] The Price of Creation, a young adult fantasy novel, follows a young man as he discovers these lessons while struggling with his own dark destiny.

The nameless Historian chances upon Surac, a village where people's talents are defined and enhanced by powerful Stones. When the blacksmith's son is born with a Stone [Whattaya mean, "born with a Stone"? Literally? Or is it like being born under a bad sign?] that marks him for violence and destruction, they find themselves hunted by friend and foe alike. When the boy is finally banished, [If I want to banish someone from my village and I can't even find him without organizing a massive manhunt, I'm thinking, until proven wrong, that he's already long gone and my problem is solved.] however, he discovers secrets far darker than the villagers' petty prejudices. Can a young man who is crafted only for violence end centuries of war? [He can, but it would take some some pretty big stones.]

The Price of Creation is the first book in a series, called the Historian’s Tales. Each book is a stand-alone story, narrated by the Historian, an unwilling immortal without a name or a past who wanders through worlds and times to witness great stories. In each book, the reader gets small glimpses of what it means to be a Historian as he shares in the lives and struggles of those he observes. [How can he not have a past if he shares in the lives of those he observes? Aren't all of his "adventures" part of his past?]

The author is an eccentric marketer who read way too many Louis L'Amour books as a kid. This left him with an enduring faith in the power of books to shape the way kids see the world. He writes under the pen name Lance Conrad. [Wait, who are you? The author's agent?] [Lance Conrad was the name I was given by the Porn Star Name Generator.] This book would be aimed at the young adult/middle grade market and is complete and polished at 64,000 words. I am grateful for your time in reading this query, I hope to hear from you soon.

Notes

There's not enough here about the story. Who's been at war for centuries? What are these great life lessons the kid learns? Are the stones accurate in predicting people's proclivities, or is it all superstition? What are the dark secrets he discovers? What's his name? Was he a baby when banished?

It seems the main plot is what happens after the banishment, and there's nothing here about where he ends up or what he does there.

This Historian wanders here and then until he chances upon a great story. But what he chances upon in this case is a village where they want to banish the blacksmith's kid. I assume this isn't a "great story" until years after the kid is banished, but how did the Historian know the banishment would lead to a great story years later? Why didn't he think, There's nothing of interest in this dump, guess I'll go somewhere cool instead of hanging around in case the kid turned out to be a rock star? If he knows the kid is a future superstar, it seems there's more involved than wandering and chancing upon. It seems he's targeting the stories he observes. Which reminds me of the historian from the future in Star Trek, the Next Generation, season 5, episode 9. He would travel back in time to observe historical events, one of which was about to take place on the Enterprise. You can watch the whole episode here. Or you can watch this 5-minute excerpt on YouTube. Or you can just move on.

Focus the query on this book. Who's the main character, what does he want, what's standing in his way, what happens if he doesn't get it, what's his plan? We need to know what happens.

Tuesday, November 19, 2013

Tim’s azure eyes bore into mine. “I can see you’re holding back some anger and – what’s this? Confusion?”

He
speaks softly but its authority fills the room. His voice seems to come
from a deeper place than ordinary mortals’ voices might. Rich and
smooth as aged whiskey, sometimes I ignore his words and let the voice
transport me to a mellow place, a place as ageless as OM.

I nod,
and a wave of shame flares though me. It’s no use hiding my thoughts. My
aura radiates any hint of negativity that courses through me, no match
for Tim’s acuity. I now strive to keep my feelings calm, even when I am
not in Tim’s presence. Armed with the knowledge that thoughts have a
physical manifestation and are laughingly obvious to those enlightened
by Higher Knowledge, every breath is now aligned with my aim to present
only a shining aura to the world.

Avoiding Tim’s gaze is
impossible. Even strangers who cross his path turn around for a better
look. His presence resonates with the hum of the universe. Animals sense
this immediately and are attracted to him.

“Yes, my teacher. My parents have been asking...difficult questions.”

His eyes don’t change.

“The
path your parents have chosen is different to the path you have chosen.
They will contaminate your pure spirit with destructive energy and
doubt. Focus yourself on the path you wish to travel.”

“They’re trying to stop me from freeing myself of the burdens of material wealth.”

“And do you have any to unburden this morning?”I reach into my jeans pocket, pull out the six hundred pounds from last night, and hand it to him. There is a flicker of joy in his eyes which pleases me immensely.He stares deeply into my eyes. “You are doing well and nearing a higher plane. Jenny is moving to the Higher Knowledge Plane and soon you will leave your corner and take her place at the Cosmo Bar. You enjoy giving pleasure?” I hear myself say, “Yes. I enjoy giving pleasure.”“You are a worthy disciple. Now go and rest; you’ll be busy tonight.”I walk out feeling joy in my heart.

Friday, November 15, 2013

1. Joe Chesterfield rides lonely Wisconsin roads in search of answers to life's meaning with nothing more than an Ipad, a fedora and a suit from Goodwill. Will his resulting memoires be an ageless paean to adolescent angst and freedom? Or will it be proof that the old "Gas, grass or ass" rule of the road is still alive and well?

2. Lance glues a big clown butt on his butt and does a silly dance that will hopefully get his kids to eat oatmeal instead of sugary cereal. Unfortunately, Lance used super glue instead of Elmer's. His board meeting is going to go well at work today.

3. He blew out his flip-flop, cut his heel on a pop top, and his new tattoo has a misspelling. But, by gosh, George is going to enjoy his first solo vacation since his wife left. Also, a shark frenzy.

4. Elijah's parents set him up with the perfect summer job, but Elijah has a better idea: street-corner panhandling with humorous cardboard signs. But when Eli's record haul is stolen by a professional beggar he finds himself in over his head in the city's underbelly. Especially when he falls for the thief's hot daughter.

5. Laid off from his job working with psychiatric patients, Parker dresses like a bum, acts like a schizoid, and demands donations from yuppie shoppers. He’s having fun and clearing hundreds of dollars a day. Then two bodies are discovered in dumpsters and the police suspect Parker. Can he find the real killers before the cops pin double murder on him?

6. Sally's facing foreclosure. Bob just got fired. Mel was kicked out by his parents when they learned he was gay. Their lives intertwine in La La Land as they're all forced to start . . . Bummin' It.

Original Version

Dear Evil Editor,

After growing up in the foster system, seventeen-year-old Elijah Briscoe wants more than a house . . . he longs to feel at home – with his adoptive parents, [Are these different from his foster parents? Have they adopted him? Why doesn't he feel at home with them?] his friends, a girl. Especially a girl. Trouble is, nobody warned him that childhood tweaked his inner wiring to make him sabotage any real connection.

So when his parents try to set up their perfect summer job for him [Practice dummy for trainees at the local bordello.], he lies about hunting for his own gig. Secretly, he and his best friends [Has he already sabotaged any real connection with these best friends or is that what happens next?] cook up a quick money-making experiment — street-corner panhandling. Their arsenal of humorous cardboard signs

is rocking awesome until some shady professional beggars rip off Eli’s record-breaking haul. Not about to lose the contest with his bros, Eli chases the thief down to reclaim his money and his pride. [Starting that paragraph with "So" suggests that Elijah thinks panhandling is going to help him feel at home with his parents, friends and especially a girl. It's not clear why he would think that. Perhaps if some of his classmates talk him into the panhandling scheme and he goes along because he craves friendship?]

What he doesn’t know is he’s not the only one chasing the money. His pursuit leads him into a hidden homeless neighborhood [Is "neighborhood" the right word? Maybe "enclave" would be better.] where he runs into Blue, the thief’s street-smart, so-hot daughter. Then when Eli witnesses a group of thugs kidnap Blue’s dad, he quickly realizes his idiotic excuse for a job has him in way over his head. Trying to play the hero, he makes a split-second decision that saves Blue [From what?] but loses her dad.

Fearing how much his choice has cost her, Eli decides he must help before time runs out. [When does time run out?] If they hope to fix this, [If "fix this" means rescue Blue's father, just say that.] they’ll have to help each other face the darkness in the city’s underbelly, the unlikeliness of their romance, and the secrets of their screwed-up pasts.
___________________________

Sincerely,

Notes

If the thugs are just after the money, I would expect them to just take it from Blue's dad. What's the point of kidnapping him? Do they think they can get a ransom?

Even the extremely rare panhandler who can make $73,000 a year is averaging just $200 a day. That might attract attention from thieves who somehow know how much Eli took in, but these thugs going after the thieves? Lets say three thieves steal $200 from Eli, and split it up. Then four thugs kidnap Blue's dad, take his $67 share of the $200, and split it up. They get less than $17 each. There's more money in robbing pizza deliverymen.

That said, the story doesn't sound like the same old same old.

I tend to think that a homeless thief and his so-hot daughter would have gone their separate ways by this point in their lives.

Presumably your completed query includes the book's title (which was in the subject line of the email), word count, genre?

Wednesday, November 13, 2013

1. Whip-cracking archaeologists may think they can steal the Sacred Stones of Szarbathia, but they're no match for... The Guardian.

2. When an alliance of alien races that has been at war with one militaristic race for decades realize they're losing, they turn to Jason, captain of The Guardian. Can Jason's knowledge of Earth's military history help lead the outclassed Entente to victory?

3. Sheldon thought his luck was bad when he found an infant abandoned on his bus. When the demons come in the night, it's clear his life has dropped into the toilet. Now on the run, Sheldon must employ all his commercial driving skills to keep the baby, and himself, from certain death.

4. It’s the 3rd biggest daily in the U.K. Oil tycoon Freddy Philips buys it and is turning it into a celebrity tabloid. Several investigative reporters conspire to dig up dirt on Freddy and force him to sell. But Freddy's secret international illegal arms syndicate replete with professional assassins will protect Freddy at any cost.

5. Voldy intends to uphold the sacred pact that his people have with the Masters. No evil will befall them while under his care. He will detect, deter, defend and destroy all threats, even if the Masters do not always understand why. And now, late at night, with strange People nearby. He will defend the Masters to his death...or until they put him away in his doggy crate. Don't they understand that those costumed children are a threat?

Jason [No last name?], Captain of the Guardian, has dedicated his ship to protecting colonies at the edge of human space from pirates and bandits. He leads from the front lines, gets his crew the best equipment available, and ensures the Guardian has the firepower of a warship. But when humanity is attacked by the first alien species they encounter, the Careons, Jason finds himself completely outmatched. [It's the Enterprise vs. the Borg, but this time the Borg have decided they don't want to assimilate us.]

After a brash stunt that destroyed a Careon ship, Jason attracts the attention of the Entente, an alliance of alien races that has been at war with the Careons for two decades. Their ships are powerful, and their technology more advanced than anything humanity has ever seen. But the members of the alliance have no history of warfare, and they’re losing. [If their lack of tactical knowledge is such a big disadvantage, how have they lasted two decades?] [Possibly because it takes two decades at near-light speed just to get to the battlefield.]

What the Entente lacks, the humans have in abundance. Centuries of fighting each other have taught them the strategies and tactics needed to change the outcome of this war. [It took humans about 20 centuries to learn that dressing your armies in brightly colored uniforms, lining them up in a phalanx, and marching them toward people with spears or arrows or guns wasn't the best strategy. Yet we who have just encountered our first alien species have already figured out how to defeat their vastly superior firepower?] Unfortunately, since being attacked, the Entente has become xenophobic. They view humanity as another violent race that could be just as dangerous as the Careons. [It's not xenophobia if they're right.]

Jason and his crew must bridge the gap between humanity and this alliance, and use humanity’s terrible past to save them all from Careon dominance. [Step 1: Prove to the Entente that a vastly superior military can be defeated: show them the film 300.]

I am seeking representation for The Guardian, a 110,000 word science fiction novel.

Thank you for your time, and consideration.

Sincerely,

Notes

Sounds like a good story if it focuses on Jason. He disappears in the 3rd paragraph. If you stress that it's Jason's knowledge of military history, rather than humanity's, that can save us all, it might help.

Is it just Jason who takes on the job of leading the Entente to victory, or is it all of humanity? If the latter, our generals and diplomats would squeeze Jason, who's captain of one outclassed ship, out of the picture. If the former, hey, how much can one guy do to end a two-decade-long war?

Perhaps examples of what the Entente have been doing wrong would help us see how we inferior humans who have no experience battling alien races can come up with a way to defeat the seemingly invincible Careons.

Tuesday, November 12, 2013

1. The Mayan priests make sure day happens, but who keeps night from going AWOL? When the Lords of Death kidnap night, its Hunahpu, the Night Guard, to the rescue. Can he bring back night before Central America is burned to a crisp?

2. Female orthodontic patients are disappearing after leaving the office of Dr. C. Edmond Kells. It's time to encase himself in acrylic and assume his old identity as the "Night Guard" to solve the case. Or suffer rampant malocclusion in prison.

3. When pop singer Krysty is found dead in her lavish bed, homicide detective Zack Martinez knows two things. One, the girl didn't strangle herself with her microphone, and two, she's not going to be hosting the VideoNet Music Awards on Saturday night. That only leaves hundreds of jealous singers and their management as suspects. Zack must enlist his daughter's playlist to solve this case.

4. Kevin, the night guard at a top secret facility, is shocked to
discover an alien is being kept hostage. When the alien telepathically
asks Kevin for help, will he be freeing an innocent being, or
jeopardizing the future of the human race?

5. You wouldn't think a hospital would need extra guards on duty at night, but when it's a military hospital reanimating soldiers so they can be sent back to the trenches, you don't want anyone stumbling onto the operation. The way 15-year-old maid Daisy Blake does. Oops.

6. Somebody has been stealing the night, and gargoyle Freddy McKay is hired to guard it. He’s paid for work between sunset and sunrise, but most of those hours have been stolen. Can Freddy solve the case before he loses his home in foreclosure?

Original Version

Dear Evil Editor,

The new maid at the London Military Hospital has three secrets that could get her sent to prison:

She speaks German, the language of the enemy, [That should get her a promotion from maid to spy or interpreter in the interrogation room. Not a prison sentence.]

And she stole the papers that identify her as Delinda Blake. She's really Delinda's sister, Daisy.

[If she's Daisy, how can there be papers that identify her as Delinda? And if there somehow are papers identifying her as Delinda, and she wants to pass as Delinda, why not leave the papers where they were instead of stealing them? Now when they check the files to see if she's really Delinda, the papers identifying her as Delinda won't be there.]

1916 London promises good wages to young women, with so many men off fighting in France. But after Delinda drowns herself, Daisy finds opportunities are few for a 15-year-old schoolgirl on her own. Mopping up blood and washing bedpans earn her room and board. And, however disgusting, her work makes a difference: A clean, fresh ward is like heaven to wounded men who lived in the stinking filth of the trenches. [You'd think by the time these guys are transported from the trenches to London they wouldn't still be bleeding all over the floor.] Further, she enjoys the patients' teasing, especially the winks from handsome Captain Ferrar of the Night Guard.

But the Night Guard has its own secret, involving the hospital's power plant, where broken men are being restored for Britain's desperate army. A dying young POW reveals the truth to Daisy and gives up another secret as well: A traitor willing to kill is at work in the hospital.

Whom can Daisy tell without giving herself away -- [Telling someone there's a traitor in the hospital doesn't give away that she's Daisy.] or putting her life in danger?

Then Delinda comes back. From the dead. [Zombie, or reanimated? Either way, it's a little late to be telling us it's that kind of book.]

My 90,000-word YA novel THE NIGHT GUARD adds elements of "Frankenstein" [Ah. Reanimated. Should have guessed from the power plant mention.] to the story of a girl struggling to make a life for herself in a city at war.

I am a writer for a national World War I organization and a copy editor at a major metropolitan daily.

Thank you for your time and consideration.

Notes

I don't see anything in the first four paragraphs that is both needed and that can't be worked into the fifth paragraph:

1916 London promises good wages to young women, with so many men off
fighting in France. But after her sister Delinda drowns herself, Daisy Blake finds
opportunities are few for a 15-year-old schoolgirl on her own. Mopping
up blood and washing bedpans at the London Military Hospital earn her room and board, and her work makes a difference: a clean, fresh ward is like
heaven to wounded men who lived in the stinking filth of the trenches.

Note that I removed handsome Captain Ferrar, as he does nothing. (I assume there's no actual romance between a captain and a fifteen-year-old.)

Now we can get to Frankenstein in paragraph 2, just by changing the word "restored" to "reanimated." You'll have to tell us what the Night Guard is when you mention it, or just say that the hospital has a secret.

Probably it's better to focus the query on one main plot point, which I'm guessing would be what's being done to the soldiers, and let the traitor and the zombie sister subplots wait for the book.

Monday, November 11, 2013

Hannah Rogers, literary agent (link in sidebar), has given up tweeting, but has granted me permission to reproduce some of her contributions to Twitdom. As you may know, Hannah accepted submissions of the first sentence of authors' novels, then tweeted that sentence plus her two cents worth.

"Someone made a mistake." Is that your first sentence, or your prediction of what I'll say when I read it?

Armageddon began with a cup of coffee. I had forgotten Starbucks prime directive: If Satan comes in, serve him decaf.

It comes on the night of the full moon. And lasts about 5 days, and if you want me to like your novel, don't bring it to me then.

It was a stately room. Specifically, it was shaped like Colorado.

I stopped dead in my tracks the moment I saw him. No one had mentioned to me that Evil Editor would be attending our slumber party.

The day I learned my twin sister was a vampire, I was shocked. Then it hit me: finally, I had an excuse to put a stake thru her heart.

The big Dutch boy wanted to fight about the ship's name again. We showed him the name, printed on the stern. That settled that.

As Leisha disembarked, the hot desert wind hit her like an anvil. She took a deep breath and blew it out like a category 5 hurricane.

I could hear the fear in my breathing - jagged and sporadic. Nothing ventured, nothing gained, I thought, and entered EE's office.

“What brings you to Mobile?” The only believable response to that question: "My GPS malfunctioned."

The man bore down on me, leering with yellow teeth. And chomping with bloodshot eyes.

"Your drug induced coma is the anteroom to my reality." And your Huh?-inducing opening sentence is the foyer to my nightmare.

Kincaid rode behind the sheep. I'm torn between wanting to know what you mean by "rode" . . . and NOT wanting to know.

In your minds, you are all special. That's because the publishing industry would grind to a halt without us . . . in our minds.

"I love you," Andi said very clearly, looking right up into his brown eyes. "I'm so glad I put up this ceiling mirror," he added.

"Don't forget to send a report about the Crom Dubh to the national data base," I called. Swallow the bagel, please; then repeat.

In this business, every once in a while, you meet a woman who's a class act. Thanks.

“Mama, Luis ate the last empanada!” Carlos whined. "The one with poison in it?" she replied. "I meant that one for you, Carlos."

I didn't know that I was psychic. Which, now that I think about it, should have been the first clue that I wasn't.

It's over. For once I can say with certainty: you're starting in the wrong place.

"Shit!" I'm a traditionalist; I prefer you give the title and word count BEFORE the genre.

She’d grown to expect it. And yet it still shocked her when the 1st sentence of a manuscript had two pronouns with no antecedents.

If days were trains, this one would have been lying at the bottom of a ravine. If openings were logs, that one would be in my fireplace.

I let the gun rest on my limp dick. No need to tell us it's limp. If there's a gun anywhere near it, it's limp.

"You're going to wear that page out, you know." Dialogue between two senators?

It’s amazing how you take oxygen for granted until you don’t have any. True, if you replace "amazing" with "perfectly understandable."

One year was wasted and gone. Trunk novel or boyfriend?

"You don’t want this, no more than I do." Well, at least we agree on something.